Surviving the 2013 Pornocalypse

While the 2013 Pornocalypse came to a head in October with a smear piece by The Kernel, the actual event has roots back to the beginning of the year.

In the first quarter, erotica writers noticed weird events like they were no longer showing up in the Top 100 on various retailers despite selling in record amounts. (And yes, indies do compare sales numbers with each other.) Several authors compared rankings/sales and discovered on Barnes & Noble, no erotica author was ranked higher the #126. It was too much of a coincidence.

At the same time, erotica no longer appeared in the Amazon search function if you searched from the main menu, even if you knew the author and title. Indies discovered their books were being slapped with the super-secret ADULT label. The problem was none of the authors knew what the criteria was.

Through experimentation, and a few assertive conversations with Amazon, Selena Kitt mapped out some of the issues and developed survival tips.

Things got a little better over the summer, then the Kernel attempted to take down Amazon with their smear piece. At which point, Amazon, Kobo and a few other retailers overreacted. The sad part is the fake alarm didn't really hurt the retailers, but it did fuck over a few thousand indie writers, most of which didn't publish erotica to begin with!

I talked about my personal issues in November. It didn't get any better in December. In fact at one point, I was banned from Amazon for six hours. Why? I asked very politely why Amazon wouldn't tell their long-time vendors what the changes in terms and conditions were because they weren't posting the info on the KDP website, but something had obviously changed.

To paraphrase the one sentence answer I received from Amazon:  We don't have to tell you shit.

(And people wonder why I don't go exclusive with Amazon.)

While retailers have the right to decide what they will and won't carry, it's the hypocrisy in their decisions aimed solely at indie writers that burns my britches. It burns Selena's too, and she goes in depth here. Unfortunately, we are not protected from corporate censorship, only government censorship. (Something a lot of Americans just don't get.)

So that means we need to play the corporate game if we want to use their retailers. Would it simply be easier for a company to have an adult filter that ADULTS can turn off if they so desire? Yes, it would, and it's exactly what Smashwords does. You know, it's pretty fucking sad when Mark Coker can outthink Jeff Bezos.

First, go read Selena's survival tips. I'll wait.

Now, here's things that have happened to me and erotica writers I know:

1) Selena's bad word list now applies to the descriptions, too. And here's the thing, THE WORDS CANNOT BE IN THERE. PERIOD. I've had two of my books banned because those particular words WERE TAKEN TOTALLY OUT OF CONTEXT.

For example, one story was about a rape survivor dealing with her boyfriends treating her like a porcelain doll. I asked politely for Amazon to reconsider, and then asked them to confirm this was the new policy. (P.S. This is the one where I got banned from the site for six hours for daring to question their policies.) I can say, "brutal sexual assault" but I can't say, "rape."

Both another writer and I used the the word, "forced", in a sentence that had nothing to do with sex. As in, "forced to leave the state to find a new job." Yet, Amazon laid down the hammer on those, too.

2) Beast erotica is the latest target of Amazon. Dinosaur porn is okay, but Bigfoot, centaurs, and satyrs aren't. Pseudo-incest? Forget it! Ironic that Flowers in the Attic is still available.

3) Covers? The policies concerning clothing and position don't make any sense whatsoever already, but things have been added to Selena's list. No partial boobs. No butt cracks. Ropes, handcuffs and whips are now verbotten. Hell, you can't even put an innocent puppy on your cover without being accused of bestiality.

The only good news to come out of this? The retailers aren't restricting actual content, just the packaging and themes.

So far.

Like I said in my November post, once we erotica writers get past the initial fallout, things will get back to normal.

Until the next Kernel writer gets rejected at a bar.

Special Thursday Writers Beware! Edtion

Vanity publisher Publish America is trying to fool writers again. A warning was issued at Writers Beware (R) on Tuesday that Publish America has changed their name to America Star Books.

They are specifically targeting non-American authors this time, saying they will translate non-English works to English editions in order to get into the American market.

DO NOT BELIEVE THEM!

If you're one of my non-American readers, don't fall for this! Real translation takes some serious money (I know because I checked into Spanish and Norwegian translations for my own works).

If you know ANYONE looking to get translations done, please WARN THEM AWAY from America Star Books!

Most of all, spread the word through your blogs and other social media, so no more innocent writers get ripped off by these people!

If you've already had problems with America Star Books or Publish America, please contact Victoria Strauss at Writers Beware. She keeps a file (and trust me, the one on Publish America is as big as the one on Author Solutions, another notorious vanity scam artist).

And if you're not already following Victoria, bookmark Writers Beware and its sister site Preditors and Editors to stay on top of the scams targeting writers.

Pulling the Plug

I know I said I was going to talk about another subject today.

But I can't because I crying too hard to do it.

For those of you who don't know, there's been an ongoing legal battle in Texas regarding a woman named Marlise Munoz. You see, the first problem is Marlise had died on the kitchen floor of her family's home two days before Thanksgiving.

The second problem was that she was twelve weeks pregnant when she died.

Retired U.S. Navy Chief Warrant Officer Jim Wright, who blogs at Stonekettle Station, talks about the horror the hospital and the State of  Texas put the Munoz family through. You see, Mr. Wright went through a similar loss around the same time.

Now, excuse me while I get another box of tissues.

(P.S. Comments have been disabled for this post.)

Return on Investment - Part 2

Last Friday, I talked about how to calculate your return on investment. Just a quick reminder:

Return on Investment = (Gain of Investment - Cost of Investment) / Cost of Investment

or

ROI = (GOI - COI) / COI

If your ROI is not a positive number, you're losing money on your investment.

If you're an indie writer who has all your rights, the next question you need to ask yourself is how patient are you. Last Friday, I used the first year's worth of data to demonstrate a negative ROI for Seasons of Magick Spring. Assuming I do absolutely nothing with the story, I will eventually break even because I OWN AND CONTROL ALL THE RIGHTS to the story.

I can fix the cover. I can raise the price. I can even bundle the four separate stories into one volume and sell it as a collection.

Here's the next step you need to consider - Opportunity Cost.
This means taking into account what you would lose by picking a certain alternative.

Opportunity costs apply NO MATTER WHICH ROUTE YOU GO--indie, assisted or traditional. It's up to you to calculate the costs.

Example 1 - Indie Only
As I said in the previous post, my typing speed was 500 words per hour in 2011-2012. Through practice, my typing speed is up to 750 words per hour. Before I do anything now, I have to consider the loss of pages by doing an alternative activity.

It will take me approximately two hours to search for a new cover for Seasons of Magick: Spring. Then there's the tweaking in Paint.net, which is another hour. Redoing e-book files with the new cover = 1 hour. Uploading to retailers and distributors = 1 hour. I'd spend five hours for re-doing one little book instead of writing 3750 new words (roughly 14 pages).

Also, remember my cost of investment for this particular story is already $435. Total units sold as of December 2013 is 148 with a income of $0.35 per copy.

($51.80 - $435) / $435 = - $0.88

I'm adding the new photo ($8) and five more hours of my time ($50). Therefore my new COI is

$435 + $8 + $34 = $493

which drags my ROI down to

($51.80 - $493) / $493 = - $0.89

I going to have to sell 22 more copies at $0.99 each to make up for the time and money spent. Definitely not worth it at $0.35 a copy.

However, if I create an anthology of the Seasons of Magick series, it's still going to take me the same amount of time and the same costs, but I can reasonably justify a higher price point of $5.99 (which actually gives the customer a discount off buying each story separately).

The photo and five hours would actually be pro-rated between the four stories, so the new COI would be

$435 + $2 + $12.50 = $449.50

And the new ROI for Spring alone would be

($51.80 - $449.50) / $449.50 = - $0.885

With the new price, my income would be roughly $4.19 per copy or $1.05 per story. Therefore, I would only have to sell three copies of the anthology to surpass my original ROI for Spring only!

Edit to add: Yes, my ROI is still negative, but the odds of a reader picking up the longer work. (See Mark Coker's analysis at the Smashwords.com blog.) When I do put out the anthology later this summer, I'll keep you folks updated.


Example 2A
The problem with most assisted publishing packages is that you, the writer, will have to pay the overhead (cover, editing, etc.) as well as 15% of your gross income to your packager.

I'm going to stick with Seasons of Magick: Spring so you can see the difference.

My gross income is $51.80. My packager gets 15% percent or $7.77, which lowers my GOI to $44.03. That same $7.77 get shifted over to COI. Therefore,

($44.02 - $442.77) / $442.77 = - $0.90

Here's the problem: packagers always take their percentage off the top. Your COI will NEVER go down. It will increase with each transaction.


Example 2B
What would have happened with a book I've made money on like Friday's example of Sluts in the City #1?

Remember the original factors for the first year were GOI was $2962, COI was $433 and ROI was $5.84. 15% of $2962 is $444.30.

($2517.70 - $877.30) / $877.30 = $1.87

Major difference going from $5.84 all the way down to $1.87. Your opportunity cost is a loss of $3.97 ROI by choosing to go with assisted publishing. This is why folks like J.A. Konrath, Dean Wesley Smith and Kris Rusch constantly preach about sticking to fixed, one-time costs when publishing your books.

IMPORTANT POINT #1! I won't be able to do anything else with this story without going through the assisted publisher. If I want to do the anthology for Seasons of Magick, I may not be able to depending on what the contract says.

IMPORTANT POINT #2! The other factor is how long an assisted publisher can collect from you after you've terminated the relationship. Many times, their contracts are worded so that they can collect 15% for the life of the copyright, which means the rest of your life plus 70 years!

WARNING: I used my fixed costs for the example. Assisted publishers generally charge you much, MUCH more for these services!


Example 3A
What about a traditional publisher? First of all, they usually won't accept a novella all by its lonesome. There are exceptions, but for simplicity's sake, let's pretend Sluts in the City #1 is a novel. To make it a little more realistic, let's assume it took me 200 hours to write the novel (200 X $10 per hour = $2000).

Let's assume instead of publishing the book myself, I sold the license to Kensington. Based on a lot of conversations lately, I could expect a $2500 advance for a first-time novelist, 6% royalties of gross for print, and 25% of net for e-books. Kensington sets both the MMPB and the e-book price at $7.99. The wholesale price is $4.00. Let's also assume I have a print run of 10,000, I still sell 1481 copies, and my print and e-book sales are split 50/50.

For the first year:

Advance against Royalties = $2500

Royalties = (741 MMPB X (.06 X $7.99)) + (740 e-books X (.25 X $4.00)) = $1,085.24

Hey, Kensington gave me more money than I would have gotten through royalties! Therefore, my ROI is

(2500 - 2000) / 2000 = 0.25

That's a positive number, I cheer.

But wait, I forgot about my agent! She gets $375 of my advance. And what about the 100 hours my editor insisted I spend promoting my book online? The bookmarks I handed out when I spoke at the local writer's group ($25.00)?

(2125 - 3400) / 3400 = - $0.38

It gets worse. Because 1481 is considered a pathetic performance, no other publisher will touch me. There's no second year because all the copies are returned and/or pulped. And depending on the terms of my contract, I probably won't be able to get my rights back.

Oh, and my agent will dump me.

In other words, I can't do a damned thing to change that negative ROI.

Example 3B
Let's change the scenario that my entire print run is sold the first month it's out.

Royalties = ((5000 MMP X (.06 X $7.99)) + (5000 e-books X (.25 X $4.00)) = $8397

Agent fee = $1259.55

So my ROI looks better right?

($7137.45 - $4284.55) / $4284.55 = $0.67

The problems start if Kensington decides my book is not worth another print run. This is ALL the money I will EVER make from the paperback version Sluts in the City #1 until I get my rights back (if I ever do). What happens if Kensington sublicenses my e-book to a subsidiary which reduces my royalties (which is a stunt Harlequin pulled)? I have no control of what happens to my book.

But more important, what are the lost opportunity costs of not publishing myself? Let's assume I sell the e-book for $4.99 and $14.99, which would give me revenue of approximately $3.45 and $2.00 per copy for the same 10,000 copies.

Lets assume my costs are $2000 for writing the book, $100 for a professional cover, $500 for editing, $150 for e-book formatting, and $500 for print formatting. Just like signing with Kensington, I'm not doing any other work myself except for the writing. I'm also not pimping myself online and not having bookmarks made.

(Please note: I'm not pulling these numbers out of my ass. I've been getting estimates for publishing A Question of Balance (formerly Sword of Justice), my NaNoWriMo project)

GOI = (5000 X $3.45) + (5000 X $2.00)
= $17,250 + $10,000
= $27,250

COI = $2000 + $100 + $500 + $150 + $500
= $3250

Therefore, my ROI jumps to

($27,500 - $3250) / $3250 = $7.46

Even better my rights aren't tied up for the life of the copyright. I can lower or raise the price as necessary. I can join with other erotica writers to create a sampler. The possibilities are endless.

I hope this information helps you in your writing journey! Q'pla!

Videos I've Been Watching Lately

So glad to see Ron Jeremy has recovered from last year's health problems! His parody of Miley Cyrus cracks me up.

Lessons Learned: Return on Investment - Part I

In all the hubbaloo over The Passive Voice, Steven Zacharius of Kensington, Barry Eisler, Robert Gottlieb of Trident Media Group and the infamous Writers Digest poll, people are trying to frame the issue as traditional publishing versus indie publishing.

People are asking the wrong damn question. If you are writer who wants to be published, you should be asking, "What's the return on my investment?"

The return on an investment is when you divide the gain of the investment minus the cost of the investment by the cost of the investment. Or

ROI = (GOI - COI)/COI

I'm going to walk through two examples: one to show my ignorance as a indie publisher in the beginning and one to show how I did it right. I'm going to simplify a few numbers for math clarity.

Example 1
Seasons of Magick: Spring was the first book I put up as an indie author.

It's approximately 20K words. At the time, I wrote about 500 words per hour, so it took me 40 hours to write the story. Let's say I, the publisher, paid me, the writer, $10 an hour.

I paid a friend's teen daughter $25 to create a Photoshop file for my cover.

A friend and I edited each other's novellas over coffee, so throw in $10 for my Starbucks card.

I know just enough HTML to be dangerous so I formatted this myself using freeware.

My costs of investment? $400 + $25 + $10 + $0 = $435.

I priced the book at $0.99. 99 copies sold the first year it was on the market. Again, for simplicity's sake, let's say I made Amazon's rate of $0.35 for all the copies (which really isn't far from the truth). My gain on investment in Year 1? 99 X $0.35 = $34.65

Therefore, my ROI for this book is ($34.65 - $435)/$435 = - $0.92

Now the nice thing is this book will be available (hopefully) for the rest of my life plus seventy years. Odds are it will eventually earn a positive ROI.

Example 2
A year after I started indie publishing I wrote a BDSM erotic romance. Since I'm not ready to reveal Alter Ego, we'll call it Sluts in the City #1.

Again, this novella was 20K words so my costs as a writer remained the same. So did my editing costs.

By now, I'd learned my lesson about having a decent cover. I'd bought the picture to the left for $8 with the intention of using it for the cover until I saw how many covers, both indie and trad, used it. So I bought a different cover at Romance Novel Covers for $15.

I used freeware to tweak the picture and add the title and author's name by myself. (I had a lot of fun experimenting, too!) Again, I did my own formatting.

My costs of investment? $400 + $10 + $23 + $0 = $433

I priced the book at $2.99. My income per copy ranges from $1.05 to $2.68, so once again, let's use $2.00 for ease of math. The first year I sold 1,481 copies so my gain on investment was 1481 X $2.00 = $2962.00.

Therefore, my ROI for Sluts in the City #1 is ($2962 - $433)/$433 = $5.84

$5.84 versus -$0.92. See the difference?

Two erotica novellas. Same length. Same amount of time they were on sale. Little to no marketing.

The two big differences were the covers and the price. Both had a significant impact on my income.

On Monday, I'll talk about determining ROI for an indie published project, an assisted publishing project, and a trad published project.

On Wednesday, I'll talk about why using a picture like the Handcuffed Girl above will hurt more than help you thanks to the Kernel Pornocalypse.

Until then, stay toasty this weekend!

Why the Digital Book World-Writers Digest Money Survey Is Flat-Out Wrong

A lot of trad publishing pundits, including Steve Zacharius of Kensington, have been quoting a survey done by DBW-WD saying the average income for writers is $1000.

Why do I think it is highly misleading on earnings for writers? Let me reframe WD's basic supposition regarding income to apply to plumbers instead of writers.

I grew up on a farm. My dad taught me the basics of home repair. I can swap out gaskets and bobbers on a toilet. I can replace a faucet. I know where the cut-off valves are for each inlet and the main one for the entire house.

Does this make me a master plumber? Hardly. Can I go to True Value Hardware and buy the parts I need? Yep. Does this mean I made money? Excuse me while I laugh.

For things that surpass my meager abilities, like replacing the hot water heater or the garbage disposal, I call our plumber Bob. Bob is a licensed master plumber and has been for twenty years. This is how Bob make his living.

For simplicty's sake, let's assume Bob makes $60K a year. If we averaged my income from plumbing ($0) and Bob's, we get $30K a year in income. Add in my husband and son who've never touched any plumbing in their life and the average goes down to $15K. Then we turn around and say all plumbers in Houston average $15K in income per year.

Silly, right? The number isn't close to being accurate because three out of the four people averaged are not plumbers!

Yet, this is exactly how WD did their survey. 64% of those surveyed haven't finished writing a book, MUCH LESS STARTED ONE.

Why on earth would you include people who HAVEN'T PRODUCED A DAMN THING?

Sorry for the shouting, but this REALLY pisses me off!

Before anyone jumps on my case, I know what it's like in the beginning. How hard it is to finish that first story. How that first novel took years to write. Been there, done that, have the t-shirt.

But nowhere in my wildest dreams do I think my $0 income from 2004 should have been included in a survey regarding the 2004 income of professional writers.

The definition of "professional" means you are making money from a trade. I wasn't making money from my writing in 2004 because I didn't have anything for sale. 64% of folks from the WD survey didn't make any money because they didn't even have anything to MAKE AVAILABLE for sale. Therefore, WD's conclusion is meaningless.

If you want to check out a survey that at least talks to writers who have stories for sale, I recommend Beverly Kendall's look at published writers. I think it gives a far more accurate look at which writers are doing what and why.

Do I think publishing will make every writer a millionaire? Heck, no! But as the late, great Mark Twain said once, "There lies, damn lies, and statistics."

Trust your gut and always question someone's statistics.

When a CEO Has No Concept of Social Media

For the record, I have nothing against traditional publishing. My regular readers know that I advocate READING AND UNDERSTANDING YOUR FUCKING CONTRACT before you EVER SIGN IT! But that's the former lawyer in me talking.

I also have nothing personal against Steven Zacharius, CEO and President of Kensington Publishing.

But apparently, Mr. Zacharius has something against me as an indie published writer according to an article he wrote in the Huffington Post. His diatribe about how I don't make any money, how I don't have any editing done, how I can't get quality cover art felt pretty damn personal. But I let go because I had a deadline...

Until a Kensington writer crafted a blog post aimed at readers saying how she was not rolling in gold. Apparently, she was being hit up quite a bit for free books. I would link to it, but within four hours of her post going live, it was taken down.

And that one big difference about indies. We talk money. We talk business. We give each other recommendations on services. But then we have our big girl and big boy panties on. I've got friends who make a lot more than I do. I have friends who make a lot less. And frankly, y'all know what I made last year.

Trad publishers don't want writers talking about their contracts. The scary part is they treat their writers like employees when they are independent contractors. Unfortunately, many writers accept this treatment because they are afraid they will be blackballed. And shunning was a real problem when trad publishers were the only game in town.

But the game has changed, folks. Big time.

Why did the Kensington author take her post down? I can only speculate in my own warped mind, but there's another problem.

Whatever you post on the internet takes on a life of its own. Even though she took the post down, it was cached. And copied. And spread. And discussed. Including at The Passive Voice.

And Mr. Zacharius responded at TPV.

All I can say is if I were Kensington's PR person, I wouldn't have any hair left after he was done. He apparently didn't know who hangs out at TPV. Sure, we're all writers. But we are also attorneys, doctors, psychologists, accountants, game designers, military vets, and teachers, just to mention a handful of the occupations. And a great many of us have been trad published.

One person published at Kensington was brave enough to comment though she did it anonymously because she's trying to get her rights reverted and fears retaliation. PG posted her comment as a main post because he felt it was important. And it is important because it shows Mr. Zacharius isn't talking to the people he needs to--those already under contract with his company.

However, J.A. ("Joe") Konrath took the questions Mr. Zacharius posed at TPV and crafted his own answers on his blog. Mr. Zacharius has said in Joe's comments that he's sending a reply to Joe, and Joe has said he will post the reply.

Can Mr. Zacharius have a meaningful dialogue with writers, or will he stick his other foot in his mouth? It should be a very interesting and entertaining Monday indeed.

Videos I've Been Watching Lately

Remember Wednesday? Talking about beagle IQs? Well, this little guy takes the cake!

Or actually the chicken nuggets.

Why Kris Rusch Is Super Smart and You Should Listen to Her

There's lots of people throwing advice left and right in the publishing world these days. Folks who've only put their first indie published book up last week. Folks who've worked for NY publishers for fifty years. Very rarely can you find someone who's a melding of both with a large dose of common sense.

If you don't know who Kristine Kathryn Rusch is, you should find out. She has written in so many genres under a variety of pseudonyms that you've probably read one of her books without realizing it.

In fact, I think the only position in publishing she hasn't held is illustrator.

Right now, she is posting a series on her blog about discoverability. I suggest you start with Part One. She's up to Seven and still going.

One caveat before you click over to Kris. This is NOT a "Three Easy Steps to Becoming a Bestseller" manual. If that's what you want, you need to go elsewhere. And frankly, if you believe writing/publishing is that simple, I have some land in Florida I want to sell you.

Kris's series looks at the long tail, i.e. how to create a career out of your writing. If that's not your worldview, nothing Kris says is going to help you. She also talks about where the industry has been in order to understand where it could possibly be going. You know the old saying about people who don't understand their history are doomed to repeat it.

I'm not saying Kris's series is the Gospel, nor should it be treated as such. But I am a huge believer in having a business plan if you want to make a living in this crazy industry, and Kris's thoughts are an excellent place to start.

And if you're reading my blog for business advice, remember that I'm only telling you what I've tried, what worked and what didn't.

I probably should re-title the blog to "Don't Fuck Up Like I Did."